Facebook has just announced its new Facebook Messages, which has been referred to as “Facebook email” or a “Gmail killer.” It’s not exactly email, but it does aim to centralize all of our messaging in the Facebook platform. Given Facebook’s scope, is this a game-changer? In this episode, co-hosts Dennis Kennedy and Tom Mighell take a look at Facebook Messages and its implications, how social media and webmail are changing our relationship to email, and whether Facebook Messages or other forms of webmail are in your future. After you listen,

I keep hearing myself say this year that is “email is broken.” Facebook Messages is the latest high visibility effort to radically change the way we use email. In part, it’s a way to give you a Facebook email address, but, more so, it’s a way to bring email, instant messages, Facebook messages and the like into a unified inbox.

We were a little wary of any high-profile “email replacement” after Google Wave fizzled out, but we explored some of the potential advantages and disadvantages of a Facebook-based approach, including potential electronic discovery issues and reservations about giving Facebook even more of our information.

I’m intrigued by the idea of a unified inbox or social media dashboard, whether it might be Facebook Messages or something yet to come. Whether or not Facebook Messages is the right answer or not, the fact is that anything available to Facebook’s 500 million users simply cannot be ignored. You’ll want to watch developments in Facebook Messages before they sneak up on you.

In our “stuff Tom and Dennis having been talking about” segment, we take a look at our practical experiences with e-book readers and share the ways we have found them useful. Tom, a longtime user of the Kindle, also talks about his experience with the iPad as an ebook reader.

We end the episode with our Parting Shots segment, in which we give a couple of useful tips. Tom talks about the Rockmelt Browser, a new browser that incoporates social media. I was dubious about a new browser, but Tom managed to get me interested in trying it, even though I haven’t started yet. I recommend the Canadian Broadcasting Company’s Spark podcast, a weekly radio show hosted by Nora Young that covers technology and its many consequences in an engaging, entertaining and educational way. I especially liked episode 127.

Let us know what you think about this episode. Show notes for the podcast are here. And try some of the back episodes as well. I recommend subscribing to the podcast on iTunes so you automatically get each new episode as it is released. You can also now follow the podcast on Twitter at @tkmreport.

Comments

I would never give Facebook access to my email, not even to auto-find my friends. In fact, I’ve been going in the opposite direction – a move towards greater privacy/security/encryption. I use TrulyMail as an email client because it has built-in encryption when sending messages to other TrulyMail users. Actually, I think they fix a lot of things that a ‘broken’ about email. For example, they use digital signatures so you know a message is from who they claim to be. They also have proper support for return receipts.

Facebook’s idea of eliminating subject lines and the CC field are really just making things worse. Do you want to sort through 100 messages without subject lines? I don’t.

Dennis Kennedy

DennisKennedy.Blog was launched on February 15, 2003.

Dennis Kennedy is one of the few technology lawyers who is also an expert on the underlying technologies. Dennis an award-winning leader in the application of technology and the Internet to the practice of law.

This site gives you access to a wide variety of Dennis Kennedy's writings and information about how you can have Dennis speak to your organization or group.

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Dennis Kennedy is one of the most knowledgeable legal technologists you will find. - Michael Arkfeld.

Dennis Kennedy, a lawyer and legal technology expert in St. Louis, Mo., has been a significant influence in the ever-evolving relationship between lawyers and the Web. - Robert Ambrogi